IN WITH THE NEW…….

‘ ²¹ No one sews a piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak; otherwise the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and the tear gets worse. ²² And nobody puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost and the skins too. No! New wine into fresh skins! [Mark 2: 21-23]

Basically what Jesus is saying is to get new skins. New skins do not mean cosmetics, liposuctions, breast implants, botox or sex changes. It does not mean anything materialistic, no ‘you were to put aside your old self, which belongs to your old way of life and is corrupted by illusory desires.’ [Ep 4: 23-25] We must recognize that our old way of life and the things that we desire from it are illusions which lead to a false sense of happiness, eventually pain and suffering would ensue, ultimately death (that is the loss of eternal life). To get new skins is to put aside your old self, to get new habits and do away with the old ones that lead to sin, depression, failure, poverty and sickness. We must first attain our news skins to receive our new wine (The Holy Spirit) and then we can continue in a life anew. ‘Your mind is to be renewed in Spirit, so that you could put on the New Man that has been created on God’s principles, in the uprightness and holiness of the truth.’ [Ep 4:23-25] It is in this new man, that life is fulfilled and happiness everlasting. A life completely opposite to what to what we are accustomed to, True Eternal Life. ‘For it is the Spirit that gives life the flesh has nothing to offer.’ [Jn 6:63] ‘For the Holy Spirit, is a spirit intelligent, holy, unique, manifold, subtle, mobile, incisive, unsullied, lucid, invulnerable, benevolent, shrewd, irresistible, beneficent, friendly to human beings, dependable, unperturbed, all-mighty, all-surveying, penetrating all intelligent, pure and most subtle spirits.’ [Ws 7:22-24]